Social media has now become a part and parcel of our lives, and everyone of us has our own reasons to be on social media. The number of social media users globally is increasing exponentially. As per reports there are 3.80 billion social media users worldwide as on January 2020, and the number is increasing everyday. While today social media platforms like Facebook, Twitter, Instagram, Tik Tok etc are gaining wide popularity among the users, Inviito, a Lima (Peru) based social media startup is all set to grab the attention of social media users with many wonderful features. The interesting part about Inviito is that it has adopted the popular features of various social media platforms and combined them into one platform, to provide an engrossing experience to the users. We interviewed Inviito founder Bill Hinostroza, to know more about the startup.
Inviito Highlights
| Startup Name | Inviito |
|---|---|
| Headquarter | Lima, Peru |
| Founder | Bill Hinostroza |
| Sector | Information Technology (Social Networks & Media/Entertainment Industry) |
| Founded | 2020 |
| Parent Organization | Inviito Inc |
| Website | inviito.com |
About Inviito
Inviito - Founder & Team
The Idea Behind Starting Inviito
Inviito - Name, Tagline & Logo
Inviito - Revenue Model
Inviito - Marketing Strategies
Inviito - Challanges
Inviito - Funding
Inviito - Advisors & Mentors
Inviito - Future Plans
About Inviito
Inviito is currently operating as an online social network and is planning to expand into being a media-services(Music & Movies/TV) provider as well, soon.
Inviito has interesting features like -
● Tik vs Tok: Where you can watch TikTok battles and see who comes out on top! Search trending hashtags, challenges, songs, etc!
● Social Wall: Share your thoughts, gifs, quotes, and links with your friends.
● Lounge: There are many rooms (General, Music, Sports, etc.) in the Lounge where you can share your interests and also learn from others.
● Cliques: Are you looking to share your thoughts with a few friends or a closed group? Welcome to Cliques where you can share with others in a more private setting.
Inviito's USP is that it unifies popular features of various social networks into one platform, and with the integration of media services to the platform, which the team is hoping to do soon, Inviito will turn out to be a one stop platform where users will be able to stay connected to the fellow users, learn, share and also get entertained.
Joining Inviito is simple. All you have to do is sign up on Inviito, set up your profile and you’re set to go. Inviito can be accessed on web as well through the Inviito iOS/Android apps.
"We believe unification is the next big step in the entertainment industry by combining social networks and online media streaming. The iPhone unified several hardware products into one we are hoping to do the same in the media and entertainment industry" Inviito founder Bill Hinostroza quotes on the startup's vision.
Inviito - Founder & Team
Bill Hinostroza is the sole Founder and CEO of Inviito. He is a self-taught web developer and an ambitious entrepreneur. He was born and raised in Chicago, IL but moved to Lima, Peru in 2019 to get closer to his ethnic and cultural background. He holds dual nationality in both countries and hopes to make an impact in the entertainment industry with Inviito. He started to learn how to code in 2011 by reading books, watching youtube videos and taking online classes from sites like Codecademy, Team Treehouse and Udacity. Since then he has worked as a contractor for Udacity, Taskrabbit and Upwork.
As for the team, presently Bill is in charge of every aspect of the company from product development, marketing, business and finances, and is being helped by two volunteers who look after social media, site moderation, maintenance, and performance optimization.
"Our work culture is relaxed as we don’t require a dress code. We push the importance of learning, innovating and how we can improve things. Lastly, we strive everyone in the company to be humble and not be an asshole by bragging or putting others down. Let your work, do the talking and help others become as good as you or better" says Bill about Inviito's work culture.
The Idea Behind Starting Inviito
Looking at the wide popularity of Tik Tok, Bill Hinostroza wanted to build something around Tik Tok. He first built up a tool viddytube.com, which let users download Tik Tok videos by typing up a hashtag or the users’ username. But he wanted to do more and later came up with Tik vs Tok that let the users compare two TikTok videos and vote for the one they liked more.
"We modified our initial product viddytube.com by adding the voting component. We used simple wireframes and Google material design to come up with the UI/UX design and we were done. It took about a week and a half to finish the Tik vs Tok feature" Bill quotes
The initial idea was to expand on Tik vs Tok. However, with limited funds the team was only able to develop web based applications so they decided to deploy familiar social network components around Tik vs Tok. Over time the platform started to look like a combination of social networks and ultimately they decided to further expand the product line by unifying other features offered by tech giants like Facebook, Twitter, Reddit etc, and rebranded the product as Inviito.
Inviito - Name, Tagline & Logo
The name Inviito is based on the Spanish word “invito” which means invite. Bill came up with a list of 17 names, of which some top names he considered for the startup were, “Nfiniito”(Infiniti), “4nity”(4-Unity) and “4llio”(4-all-in-one). Bill later felt that these names were not easy and relatable enough for the potential users, which made him stick to the name 'Inviito', and after taking feedback form around 50+ people the name was finalized.
"Coming up with the name was more difficult than you would expect. You need to make sure that the social media handles were not taken, the .com was available and that you can incorporate with it. Apart from that, you also have to make sure it fits with what you are building and the industry you are in."Bill says.
Inviito's tagline is “Always Innovate”. The tagline reflects Inviito team's belief and endeavor to find new ways of making things better.
The logo for the company was mainly inspired by two companies (Google and Apple). Both companies incorporate a rainbow design. Google with their name and Apple with the apple logo. Bill decided to integrate the similarities and give it a distinctive touch by making the background black and choosing a different color scheme that is similar to a rainbow.
Inviito - Revenue Model
Inviitos’ revenue sources ranges from ads, affiliate links, donations, sponsorships, promotions from brands, individuals, and/or influencers. However, as the company matures the team is hoping to cut down the sources of income to just two models.
1. Have a self-serve ad auction system
2. Monthly subscription fee for more premium services like on demand music and Movies/TV with ads and no ads.
Inviito - Marketing Strategies
Inviito team currently is not spending much on advertising. Social Media has been the go to marketing channel for Inviito since its inception, and the team posts videos and interacts with potential users on a regular basis. Apart from social media Inviito also posts subreddits that deal with startups. Lastly, they created a ProductHunt post for Inviito and got selected to be featured on July 15, 2020 which helped out tremendously for launch.
Besides, the Inviito team is also focusing on Influencer marketing, and is reaching out to influencers on Instagram and Tik Tok to promote the platform. Word of mouth publicity is helping the startup in attracting new users.
Inviito - Challanges
Converting Inviito's web application to mobile app was a challenge for the team, as no team member was experienced in app development.
"Not having an app in the app store was a big market we were going to miss. So, we had to do a lot of research and get creative as we don’t have the funds to create a native app. Luckily, we were able to use Webkit/Webview to create our iOS/Android apps and utilize the native functions that are available on the mobile operating systems to upload photos, use the camera to take pictures, grab user location and send push notifications etc" Bill says explaining how the startup overcame the challenge
Inviito - Funding
Inviito has been entirely bootstrapped by Bill Hinostroza, and the startup is looking forward to raise a seed round soon.
Inviito - Advisors & Mentors
There are currently no advisors/mentors on board but the Inviito founder is ready to Welcome anyone that has worked for and has experience under related companies like Facebook, Twitter, Google, Spotify and Netflix.
Inviito - Future Plans
Inviito team's long term vision is to build the media-services (music and video streaming) side by side and unify it with its current social media platform. Inviito is all set to become the next big entertainment platform by unifying all of the big tech companies’ main features/products into one. For example User Profiles(Facebook), Social Wall(Twitter), Lounge(Reddit), Jam(Spotify), and Flix(Netflix).
"We believe consumers will continue to increase their online consumption and find other social networks and media/entertainment alternatives (Ex: TikTok). We hope Inviito will be one of those platforms within the next five years." says Inviito founder Bill Hinostroza revealing the startup's future plans
Link : https://startuptalky.com/inviito-social-media-platform/
Author :- Chayanika Goswami
August 06, 2020 at 10:12AM
startuptalky